Leach said PCI chose to host the cyber security conference in South Africa after what he calls “an amazing growth of mobile payments.”

“South Africa, while it is growing and now can serve the unbanked, needs the right security to be put be put in place. At the same time the security should not become a problem for merchants, who also need the technology to be secure,” he told Fin24.

PCI also on Wednesday announced its plans to evolve the PCI Qualified Security Assessor (QSA) program to attract new cyber talent globally and ensure sustainability and quality in a changing payment environment.

The initiative will be rolled out in phases, beginning in 2017 with a dedicated industry task force focused on the development of an Associate QSA certification.

“With various payment methods available for customers and merchants, things like bank cards which have three methods of payment become more secure from card cloning, but at the same time hackers find new methods to breach their security,” Leach said.